Budget supermarket chain launches its own low-cost Android tablet in the U.K.

On Sunday, U.K. budget supermarket chain Aldi launched a low-priced Android tablet priced at £79.99 ($131 USD). Long lines greeted cashiers at Aldi markets, waiting to purchase the low-end Medion Lifetab Android tablet. At one store at Old Kent Road in South London, hundreds of shoppers battled to purchase one of only 12 slates that were remaining.

The supermarket's Lifetab slab now competes with other low priced 7 inch Android models in the U.K., including the £99 ($162 USD) Amazon Kindle Fire, the £119 ($195 USD) Tesco Hudl, and the £199 ($325 USD) Nexus 7. For comparison, the Apple iPad mini with Retina display is priced at £319 ($521 USD) with a slightly larger 7.9 inch screen. Despite being priced at least £20 cheaper than the competition, the Medion Lifetab tablet is said to be light on features. Compared to the Tesco device, the Lifetab tablet has a lower resolution screen, and a less powerful processor. It also features 8GB of storage and a 4-hour battery life.

Available in black only, the tablet will have access to the Google Play Store and will be equipped with a media player app, a drawing app, an app that is a knock-off of Microsoft Office, and a 30-day trial of Kaspersky Tablet Security.

CCS Insight says that 8.3 million tablets were sold in the U.K. last year, and for the first half of this year, nearly 6 million slates were rung up. As we can see from the long lines for the Lifetab tablet, demand for low-priced Android slates is heavy in the U.K. Since September, the low-priced Tesco model has sold 200,000 units.


source: DailyMail, The Guardian